


Paradise is Empty

by Kryptodrakon



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Brief Non-Graphic Suicidal Thoughts, Gen, Poor Noctis, This Went To a Dark Place, canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-07-11 06:28:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15966620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kryptodrakon/pseuds/Kryptodrakon
Summary: The reward for saving the world isn't much of a reward.





	Paradise is Empty

She visits him on the third day, announcing her presence with the fog on his breath and the sudden chill in the air. Noctis looks up from where he’s sitting hunched over the table to find Gentiana seated across from him. 

 

Her eyes are wide open, her visage shifting occasionally to ice. Wearing the face of the messenger is entirely for his benefit. 

 

“You are unhappy here, King of the Stone.”

 

He is. Desperately so, because when the Six had spoken of a peaceful end he’d foolishly believed he’d be allowed to simply wink out of existence. It had taken time to come to terms with it, but he’d accepted it. 

 

The gods, in their kindness, have delivered him not to oblivion, but in a misguided attempt to make him a heaven they’ve instead dropped him straight into hell. 

 

The Glacian looks troubled. He reasons that she’s the most human among them, and appreciates that she at least seems to realize on some level that they’ve erred. “What does the king require?”

 

He doesn’t know what to tell her, because he knows that what he needs isn’t in her power to grant. 

 

\---

 

He wanders the empty facsimile of Leide, past Longwythe Peak and its buried secret. The motel where they’d stayed so often between Cindy’s garage and wherever their journeys dragged them stands void of any sign of life, the only sound the pages of the Cosmogeny on the table lifting in a non-existent breeze. There’s no wind here, no bird calls or insects, no rustling of grass or passing cars. No friends, no family, no enemies. No animals, either; he even misses the occasional ambush by a pack of hungry voreteeth. He’d fight the adamantoise single-handed just for a change of pace. The sun never sets, so he marks the days by how far he walks, from Hammerhead to Galdin Quay and northwest into Duscae. The chocobo outpost is empty, without even a single golden feather to mar its pristine grass. The disc of Cauthess is silent and still. Lestallum is a ghost town. 

 

He begins talking to himself to fill the silence, recounting aloud his fondest memories from each place he passes, holding conversations with his friends in his head. He’s losing his mind in monotony and quiet, cracking up in the face of an eternity of isolation. 

 

He wants it to end, and he tries everything he can think of, but he can’t kill what’s already dead. 

 

He rides the elevator to the bottom of the Balouve mines and screams until his throat bleeds. 

None of it makes any difference. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Well this went to a dark place. 0.0  
> I'm in the process of cleaning out my google docs and this was marked as finished. I honestly don't remember when I wrote it or where it came from or whether I'd originally intended to continue writing a happier ending, but obviously I never got there if I did, so have this uncomfortably BAD NEWS little snippet of torment I guess.


End file.
